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From October 2016 to March 2017 the team is joined by Guest Kats Rosie Burbidge and Eibhlin Vardy, and by InternKats Verónica Rodríguez Arguijo, Tian Lu and Hayleigh Bosher.

Tuesday, 31 May 2016

Justin
Bieber and Skrillex have been accused of copyright infringement by artist Casey
Dienel, aka White Hinterland. The suit probably does not come as a complete
surprise to the duo as Dienel claimed that she contacted Bieber’s lawyers when
“Sorry” was initially released, but did not receive a response.

Dienel
alleged that Bieber and Skrillex, whose 2015 hit single ‘Sorry’ has received 1.4 billion hits on YouTube, copied her vocal loop from
her 2014 song ‘Ring the Bell’. The allegedly copied segment can
be heard in the first five seconds of each song. Skrillex and Bieber have both
denied the claims on their Twitter accounts.

Unlike his song lyrics to Selena Gomez, Bieber isn't sorry about this alleged copying

If this claim goes to trial, it could be the
2016 edition of the infamous “Blurred Lines” dispute, which resulted in Pharrell Williams and Robin
Thicke being ordered to pay Marvin Gaye’s family $7.4 million USD for
infringing copyright in his 1977 hit ‘Got to give it up’ (discussed on IPKat here).

After the
‘Blurred lines’ case, this Kat would be surprised if Bieber’s lawyers took this
case to trial, but let’s consider what Dienel would need to prove to win her
claim for infringement:

The later
work must be substantially similar to the earlier work for a finding of
copyright infringement. Determining substantial similarity “includes a
qualitative as well as a quantitative aspect.” (Abrams, §14.16).
This Kat played both songs at the same time and thought there was undeniable
overlap between the two sounds. Dienel’ loop has four beats whereas Bieber and
Skrillex’s has five, but it is the similarities rather than the differences
which have to be compared.

Even if the
works are substantially similar, copyright law will not protect a work if the
later work was independently created (Abrams, §14.7).
Skrillex tweeted a video showing how the loop in question was
produced, demonstrating his stance on this issue.

Proof

Proof of
copying can be direct or indirect. Direct proof could be an admission of
copying by the defendants or testimony of a direct observer of the
copying. Dienel is unlikely to have
direct proof so she would have to rely on indirect proof. This would include
the availability of the work to the accused copier and the similarities between
the two works.

Daniel’s
song is available on YouTube and Spotify so it would have been easily
accessible by Bieber and Skrillex. As for the similarity, US DJ Diplo weighed in on the matter when questioned by TMZ; “I thought
they sampled it…but I thought they cleared it. Yea, seems pretty easy to do.”

Significance
of the claim

Musical
copyright claims such as this one skate a thin line between protecting the
creations of artists and chilling future creation. It is difficult to determine
when a song has copied rather than been inspired as artists are inevitably
influenced by earlier works. The video
Skrillex posted indicates that a similar sound or technique was used in
producing the song, rather than taking a direct sample from ‘Ring the Bell’. It
might be the case that Bieber and Skrillex were inspired by the earlier sound and decided to create their own version to incorporate into ‘Sorry’, using
different pitch, timing and placement.

Are Bieber and Skillex copycats or creative cats?

In this
instance, whether Bieber was inspired or unlawfully imitated Dienel’s vocal loop,
‘Ring the Bell’ pales in comparison to the global success that ‘Sorry’ has
achieved. It’s not surprising that Dienel
would feel slighted and pursue a claim to reap the rewards that her song didn’t
produce.

2 comments:

@Anonymous haha, no need for even a twitter trial at this rate because the copyright expert from 'On Air with Ryan Seacrest' (you may know this site as a source for celebrity gossip) has already decided the case based on the damning twitter evidence- http://onairwithryan.iheart.com/articles/headlines-496147/skrillexs-recent-instagram-post-basically-debunks-14766784/

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